Arch Linux User Repository

Although very very old, this "mailcap" spec and its associated helper tools (like this tool "run-mailcap" might still be of interest for anyone wanting to "escape" the "xdg-open/xdg-utils" hell.

There are still today, new apps being developed with support for the "mailcap" spec. Ex, "telescope"

There are still today, new helper tools showing up to manage those mailcap/mime association.

You dont necessarly need those helper tools. You can just edit by hand "/etc/mailcap" or "~/.mailcap" "~/.config/mailcap" etc.

One interesting might be, https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/run-mailcap-rs-git

In is an alternative to this PKGBUILD "run-mailcap", an old debian perl script.

Seems to be actively maintained, https://github.com/cglindkamp/run-mailcap-rs

2023-12-02 Christian Glindkamp I [master] {origin/master} {origin/HEAD} Handle errors better and provide an exit

This is rewrite of run-mailcap in Rust.
Why a rewrite?
~~Run-mailcap seems to be unmaintained at least on Gentoo, so .........

Why not using xdg-open?
Run-mailcap has multiple advantages over xdg-open........
....
A mailcap file on the other hand is simple text file.........

Additional information about "mailcap" the spec, and mailcap related tools.

the Archlinux official package "mailcap" is a mandatory dependency for big names like Firefox and github-cli,

$ pacman -Qi mailcap

Name            : mailcap
Version         : 2.1.54-1
Description     : Helper application and MIME type associations for file types
URL             : https://pagure.io/mailcap
Provides        : mime-types
Required By     : firefox  github-cli  mat2
Conflicts With  : mime-types
Replaces        : mime-types
Installed Size  : 115.82 KiB
Packager        : Jan Alexander Steffens (heftig) <heftig@archlinux.org>
Build Date      : Thu 01 Jun 2023 03:02:55 AM WEST
Install Date    : Thu 21 Mar 2024 02:15:33 PM WET
Install Reason  : Installed as a dependency for another package

That "mailcap" package is not a "tool" or "binary" to run something. It is just a set of text files and added associations that land in "/etc"

$ pacman -Ql mailcap

mailcap /etc/mailcap
....
mailcap /etc/mime.types
....
mailcap /etc/nginx/mime.types
....
mailcap /usr/share/man/man5/mailcap.5.gz

The package itself, comes from Redhat "pagure"

URL             : https://pagure.io/mailcap

What they do, is basicallly just checking and copying the IANA "mime types" specification. And regularly updating that "/etc/mime.types" file with some python maintenance scripts. They also "stuff" xdg-open as a default for everything in "/etc/mailcap". And so has it is indicated by, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Default_applications#run-mailcap

Warning: If you use run-mailcapAUR, it is possible for xdg-open to delegate to it. This will cause an infinite loop if you are using the /etc/mailcap from mailcap, because it also delegates to xdg-open.

The optional "tools" to work with this filethan can be used are things like this PKGBUILD "run-mailcap"

@terminalmage:

Thank for showing up and taking care of this package. I thought it was abandoned, looking at your activity maintaining other PKGBUILDs.

It is still a useful package

It might be for some users.

Although I might warn others that, as it happened to me, and, as I later found a warning in Archwiki, it can clash with xdg-open. It ends up leading to horrible orphan and zombie processess trying to open mailto: links etc. In the end I decided not to use it. And prefer other solutions more predictable, native and simple solutions to managing this horrible bazaar complexity of xdg/mailcap/mime etc.

Not to scare anyone, but here it goes, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Default_applications#Resource_openers

....
Warning: If you use run-mailcapAUR, it is possible for xdg-open to delegate to it.
 This will cause an infinite loop if you are using the /etc/mailcap from mailcap,
 because it also delegates to xdg-open.
....

And study also, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Xdg-utils

...In the generic case, xdg-open will: 
.... Delegate to run-mailcap if present

The package has been updated and the description clarified.

It is still a useful package, and it should not be deleted.

This is a very old PKGBUILD that references a obsolete 2014 Ubuntu version. It should be removed. It only confuses archlinux users looking for mailcap related tools.

Conflicts:  mime-support 

There is no PKGBUILD "mime-support" anymore.

Upstream URL:   http://packages.ubuntu.com/utopic/mime-support

references a 2014, Ubuntu 14.10 (Utopic Unicorn) version.

And leads to a non existing page,

Error
two or more packages specified (mime-support utopic)

As of 2022 there is no "run-mailcap" package in recent versions of Ubuntu. The only thing related to "mailcap" in Ubuntu is, according to, https://packages.ubuntu.com/ a package called "mailcap", https://packages.ubuntu.com/source/jammy/mailcap

Updated to 3.60.

Thanks, I'm with family today but will get this updated in the next day or two.